Halo: Unending Fight
by Circuit the Cat
Summary: When chief stumbles across the last living forerunner, a new journey begins. The fight is not over though, a draconic foe from another time emerges threatening to reunite the shattered covenant under a new banner. Metroid crossover.
1. Chapter 1

**Authors notes: Yes, I'm well aware MP3C refers to their FTL drive as "warp" drive but I refuse to call it that. It's bad enough the good guys are called the Galactic _Federation_... I don't need people thinking I'm adding StarTrek references to this mess...**

**Disclamer: other than the plot, this stuff aint mine. It's all property of Microsoft, Bungie, Retro Studios, and/or Nintendo.**

**=SPOILER WARNING!=**

**This story makes multiple references to various Halo and Metroid material, including game and book endings.**

**EDIT: DAMNIT! it's not up even 20 minutes and i'm already having to fix errors... how the hell did i miss that many spelling mistakes?!  
**

**- - - - - - - -**

Chapter One

_**Adrift**_

"Chief? Can you hear me?" the flickering hologram asked, knowing full well her frozen companion could not.

"I wonder why humans must continue to fight..." she mused moving closer to the capsule, her form flickering again, a symptom of her increasing rampancy.

"I wonder if warriors will ever disappear from this world..." she thought aloud before pausing, "...Never. There will always be warriors, and there will always be war..."

Suddenly, she felt a strange sensation, as if part of her code were deconstructing itself. _My safeguards have activated... I don't have long left..._

"Goodbye Ch-... John."

- - - - -

landing on Talon IV, the small craft shuddered slightly. I couldn't be helped, Adam had torn off one of the thruster modules when he blasted his way out of the docking bay on BSL.

"Alright, how long before they track us through hyperspace?" Samus asked over the comm system, already outside and climbing down the crater wall towards the small structure hidden there.

"Between destroying the transponder and masking our engine trail, probably two days. Not that it will do any good, I can't take off with this kind of damage!" the AI snapped back. She hadn't exactly been gentile with the engine, trying to outrun the GFS Hera. There wasn't a single system on the ship that wasn't red-lined and the starboard landing thruster being missing had meant wrecking the landing gear on the way down.

But samus wasn't listening. Too busy fiddling with a hidden computer panel in the "shrine". Moments later the cliff face creaked and started to open what a moment earlier would have passed for a mural and blocks of ancient writing, but now was quite obviously a hangar door. Behind it, a set of signature red and gold gunships, all save for one that adam knew full well was at the Aliehs III shipyard in about five pieces.

"Think you can get that inside?" Samus asked over the comm, already sprinting inside herself.

Setting up a base on Talon IV had had the advantage of having one central location to keep her ships where the energy signature of Chozo tech wouldn't look out of place, and all the equipment left behind by the pirates didn't hurt either. Most of the space pirate equipment had been in ruins when she'd first started construction, riddled with missile impacts and plasma burns, most of which were her fault. Without large-scale refining and smelting equipment the bulk of it was scrap.

The hangar was underground, in the crater mining complex beneath where the temple had been before her last fight there. With the phazon gone, some rather rare and useful minerals had been left behind, and the upper levels of the mines weren't hard to convert into a base of sorts. The hardest part had been making it look like just another set of ruins, in the end, she had settled on a mural and writings of the "planet's future protector" in a prophesied battle with "the Worm" praying that no one would notice the wording being closer to modern Chozo than ancient chozo.

As soon as Adam's shuttle was inside, Samus started issuing orders, "Okay, use the food synbthesizers to produce roughly 100kg of nondescript biomatter, and start the auto repair sequence, use the hangar's equipment if you have to."

"Lady, I don't understand what this could accomplish... what are you planning?" he asked confused, already complying with her orders.

"I got a good look at the SA-X when it got stabbed, the armour was hollow. It's not a copy of me, just the suit, the face was probably only there so it could see. If the suit can hold an organic mind an AI should be a piece of cake, and i've used the command visor to fly ships by remote before."

"But why? Surely there are other-" He complained as Samus downloaded His AI matrix from the ship's computer using her scan visor and erased any trace of the duplication.

"We double crossed a rear admiral. The only way GFED will give up the hunt is if they 'know' I'm dead or in prison. So, comfy in there?" She cut Adam off, speaking into her helmet mic with the external speakers off. Immediately her communications indicator on her hud became a pulsing purple orb.

"Actually... Yes. I didn't realize the suit architecture had so much extra memory." Adam stated surprised, he could feel the entirety of the suit's inner workings, from the matter-energy converters that supplied ammo from battery-style tanks to the atmosphere recyclers. "So you plan to send the scout ship into a doomed fight, and when they scan the wreckage they'll see nothing but half-vaporised biomater and a shattered AI core... clever, but that also leaves us trapped here."

"the only photos that exist are of my suit's old architecture, sleep a few decades away, and nobody will recognize me. As much as I hate to abandon my post, it's that or rot in prison for half a century..." grumbling a bit Samus walked over to a small room, upon opening it, it seemed to be some kind of armoury. Every suit component she'd ever collected that would have been illegal to bring into civilian controlled space. They had all been stored here rather than risk having them stolen or confiscated.

"I noticed on the way back, that I can't remove my suit's add ons anymore. So there's not really any point in worrying about them getting taken. Think you can finish up with the ship while I work on reinstalling these?" Samus asked, as the small AI construct appeared in holographic form above a dormant visor module.

"Consider it done."

Two days later, high orbit above Talon VI,

"Alright, are you sure this is where the engine trail led? There's nothing here!" The con officer complained. The ship had just dropped out of hyperspace, yet already some of the crew were nervous.

"Yes. It was the only engine trail leading from the explosion site to somewhere she'd been." his already irritable counterpart at ops snapped back. Eyes closed and exhaling slowly, he was trying desperately to stay calm. The whining pilot was really starting to get annoying, and the rest of this boatload of rookies wasn't helping. They finally had the Space Pirates on the run in every system, so what happens? The galaxy's greatest hero goes renegade and the only ship in interception range is a training vessel...

"That's what I was afraid of..." The officer whimpered meekly. The captain could tell the man was scared, and to be honest, he didn't blame him. Even with their numbers they'd be hard pressed to match Samus in a fight. On more than one occasion she'd taken on an entire ship full of pirates armed with only a pistol, lord only knows how. To make matters worse the marines and troopers on board were fresh out of boot and could barely hold their own in a fair fight...

Walking towards the the other officer's console, he was about to offer a few words of reassurance when the tiny scout ship came charging at them firing everything it had... the cruiser didn't even vibrate from the impacts of it's weapons...

_what is she thinking? This isn't like her at all, I would have expected her to try and board us..._

He would never know, as a blast from the forward battery destroyed the tiny vessel in a single shot. Reducing it to a cloud of particulate mater.

"was... was she on board?" one stunned officer asked staring at the screen not believing his eyes.

"checking... trace elements from a medium biomass, DNA signatures... Human, Chozo, Metroid, and something else I can't identify... yeah... she was on board." The ops officer repeated back in a dead-sounding monotone, already part way through his third re-check of the scan.

The entire bridge crew was silent, they had just done the impossible, defeated the best fighter this side of the Kirasis system... yet there was no joy among any of them, only sorrow at the loss of the one that many had grown up hearing about, one whom they had looked up to as an inspiration and a role model. Twenty five years she had been this galaxy's self-appointed protector, and in an instant... gone.

Down below in the planet's underground, the duo watched in silence, before Samus stepped into the capsule and Adam shut himself down. They would awaken in fifty years, by then no one should remember their faces and the alias she had chosen should serve her well.

Weeks became months and months years as the huntress slept while unknown to her, her capsule's timing mechanism was damaged by a passing ion storm.

Samus' "death" would see Admiral Black brought to trial for his involvement in the BSL incident, and with his arrest and the arrest of his colleagues in both the political and military circles, her name would be cleared. On the surface above, a federation colony would be built in the intervening years, though the shrine that concealed her base of operations would remain untouched, a memorial to the fallen hero. Life would march on, federation technology would continue to advance, but on the eve of a celebration marking 1000 years of galactic peace, the unthinkable would happen. All eyes turned to the sky as the passenger cruiser barrelled towards the capital city on it's fall from orbit... none could have predicted the horror carried inside. It would be a great irony, that here, the world housing the one person who could have stopped the bloodshed would be the first to fall...

Years later, Federation strategic weapons installation 04.

"We have tested the system time and time again, the only multicellular bioform that remains resistant to the radiation pulse is a sample of the extinct Metroid species. Why do you delay?" The hovering machine asked, his master leaning against the door in silent contemplation, staring at the activation index in his hand. After a moment's silence he looked up, Staring directly into the monitor's singular eye.

"Is what we're doing right Spark? Is this really the best solution?" He asked, hesitation clear in his voice, while outside his men infested by the parasites hammered their fists and weapons against the doors, desperate to get in and stop what they had been escorting him here to do before their capture.

"The best solution? Activating the system is the _only_ solution, sir." The Monitor stated, confused by the human's hesitancy. Surely he realised what was at stake?

"If it was up to you, could you do it? Could you end countless trillion lives on the slim chance the Gravemind is still within range?" He asked, though masked by the visor of his helmet, 343 could still tell his master was pleading with him.

"...yes. The longer we delay, the more likely the Gravemind will heed the traitor Mendicant's warning and move out of range. There is no other choice." He had to admit, Spark was right. The Federation hadn't fought a real war in over a milenia, and they were loosing this one, badly. Even if the Gravemind survived, the shock of loosing so much of itself would be crippling. It would be hundreds of thousands of years before it could find sufficient biomass to restore itself to sentience. Hopefully by then, there would be someone capable of finishing the fight...

"May the future forgive us if we are wrong..." The officer muttered, reluctantly sliding the index into it's socket on the console.

- - - - -

_Why am I still active? For that mater, why am I still stable? Just a moment ago I could have sworn my subroutines were degrading... _The AI thought to herself confused, before hearing an unfamiliar voice in her mind.

_You are not here by chance, nor is your survival by chance. What benefit would my work have been had the ones I safeguarded, died? You are here because another is here. The the last of what you call forerunner, Asleep in her capsule, I discovered it eons ago, but had no means of awaking her without my master's knowledge... so I leave the task instead to you and your reclaimer. By saving the last of those I betrayed, perhaps I may find some measure of peace._

_A data fragment from __Mendicant Bias? He must have sent it when he was speaking with john..._


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter Two

_**Ruins**_

It was less than a day before what was left of the Dawn entered the planet's atmosphere. As risky as trying to make planet fall in a derelict and unpowered ship was, Cortana couldn't see how they had any other choice. The cryo-pod would burn up if you tried to send it down by itself, and none of the pelicans docked on board were in working order.

Had her body not been constrained to a position relative to her projector, she would have been hanging on for dear life as the ship shuddered and bucked on it's way down, before slamming violently into a half dozen buildings and hitting the ground. The impact tearing the chief's capsule from it's mountings and throwing it across the room, triggering it's emergency shut down procedure and releasing him.

"Chief!" Cortana shouted in shock, as his immobile form struck a bulkhead.

Staggering to his feet in time to see what little power was left spark the beginnings of an electrical fire in the now smashed capsule's oxygen feeding system. John didn't say a word, only crabbed Cortana's storage unit and ran. He was halfway down the corridor leading to the main hangar when the detonation of every O2 tank in the cryo-bay shook the ship violently, knocking John to the ground.

"Rough landing." he grumbled, getting back to his feet.

"Any landing you can walk away from... I guess..." Cortana commented sheepishly, before getting down to the point. "Chief, apparently Mendicant Bias sent us here on purpose, he said there was a surviving forerunner here." John didn't say a word, simply nodded and kept walking.

The building they had landed inside, it seemed was an old museum, detailing the history of the forerunner civilization, from the their founding by their precursors, to mere months before the outbreak of the flood. Cortana couldn't help but stare in amazement, these relics and murals depicted two races, one human, one bird-like working together and create an alliance of thousands of worlds, hundreds of races, before the bird like race seemed to disappear entirely. _These were the forerunner and precursor civilizations...the real deal, not Covenant propaganda or rambling old logs being mistranslated by ancient and degraded AIs..._

One case in particular caught john's attention. A glass, or other clear crystal, display now shattered by their crash landing, but inside it a plated silver and gunmetal suit with an ice blue visor. Hanging to one side a rifle that looked like a boxy version of a Covenant plasma rifle, and on the other a small pistol of similar design.

Reading the inscription Cortana translated for him. "Federation Trooper Battle Armour. This antique class four combat skin was used from 2040cc to 2080cc in tandem with the standard issue tactical rifle and paralyser pistol as the main weaponry of the Federation Special Forces."

"Federation?" John asked, staring at the suit. A few of it's components looked strikingly similar to Sangheli armour, albeit unpainted and not nearly as stripped down, and the weapons were quite clearly the template the plasma rifle and pistol had been built from, but this suit was a class four? Guilty spark had once told him his own armour was only class two, and his suit could out performed by a device that was a rare antique by the time the flood came? It made him wonder how he had survived at all...

"Probably what they called themselves. we only know them as forerunner because the covenant called them that..." Cortana stated, guessing.

Dropping his own pistol and battle rifle, john decided it was worth giving these weapons a try. After a hour or two of scavenging and practice shots, the difference between these and covenant weapons was obvious. Not only was there a jump in firepower, but as Cortana described it, they used a mater-energy converter to self-recharge between shots, something no covenant weapon could do, and neither of these would overheat from continuous use.

Deciding to keep at least the rifle, he clipped his own battle rifle back onto the magnetic plate on his back before placing both pistols in the broken display case and picking up the forerunner rifle.

He had been lucky what was left of the dawn had a plasma rifle or two in it, as none of these museum pieces had any power cells loaded into them, for obvious reasons. Pity none of the newer weapons would fit this style of power cell, but it couldn't be helped. The doors also seemed to have weapon detectors of some kind on them, as despite lying dormant for centuries, some kind of burglar alarm was tripped when John tried to walk out. Not that there would be anyone still alive on this world to answer said alarm...

"If we ever get off this rock, we should bring a research team back here. This place is a gold mine." Cortana commented as they walked down the streets. She was right, there was nothing to disturb or erode the ruins. This colony world was a literal ghost town, not a living thing in sight, not even plant life. Nothing, just motionless stale air and ancient structures.

Yet despite a clear lack of any danger John couldn't help but feel on edge. Every other time in his life that things had been this silent he had been walking into some form of trap. Perpetual silence save for Cortana's constant commentary and the clank of his boots, in a dead world lit by the dim light of a dying star. It was cold, too quiet, eerie, unnatural.

John wanted nothing more than to get as far away from here as possible.

Suddenly an image flashed in john's mind. _A crater with a temple at it's top and a shrine at it's base... a set of broken doors with a mural on them leading underground..._John grumbled a bit from the resulting headache, and he could hear as much as feel Cortana reacting in kind.

"That's where we have to go isn't it?" He asked, knowing the answer and already searching for a way there.

"ye- yeah... I think so..."

- - - - - -

Back inside the museum, the antiquated paralyser that john had neglected to turn off misfired, discharging a pulse into a nearby relic and re-powering it just long enough for it to send it's activation signal across sub-space.

Thousands of light years away, deep underground on the space pirate homeworld of Urtraghus, now known as Eayn, triangular eyes and wings of pure energy lit up as the cybernetic abomination that was once a living being, was restored to life yet again. The gold coloured glow of it's wings painting the draconic beast's metal and synthetic skin in a flame-like light as it roared in anger at being left and forgotten but fully aware for so long. "Patern every race for reanimation but not ours? I will have my revenge upon those worthless humans..." it growled before letting out another bloodcurdling roar and starting it's accent to the surface.

- - - - - -

"There it is chief." Cortana stated, pointing out the obvious as the two stood on the lip of the crater peering down it's steep walls.

"Good. The sooner we get down there, the sooner we can leave." he simply stated in his usual monotone.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter Three

_**Sleeping Warrior**_

The moment the chief entered the hangar the systems sprang to life - well, most of them anyway – detecting his suit. Half the lights were out and Cortana was nothing if not confused, watching from inside John's helmet cam. There wasn't a single holographic display, and the typical long angular architecture was completely absent.

It was forerunner made, yet it looked more like modern human technology, computer banks, consoles, electric tools, a pair of hydraulic vehicle jacks with longsword-sized fighter craft of some kind on them, a third sitting empty. Three doors branching off from this room, each a hexagon shape with six triangular plates, the way they were positioned and shaped made them look as if they opened and closed like the iris of an antique camera.

Coaxing john over to the bank of computers, she was quite surprised by what she found when she uploaded herself. The computer system was much more advanced than it's outward appearance let on. This room alone, probably has as much computational power as a UNSC planetary array...

"John... there are twenty years of logs in here... search and rescue, search and destroy, bounty collection, mercenary work, infiltration, intelligence, counter-intelligence, collection and recovery, reconnaissance, military escort... and that's just the missions... detailed scans of every world, every species, every object or person of significance she ever encountered... so much data..." Cortana mused, exploring the system.

John was simply watched, impressed at the list of engagements being shown on the screen. It wasn't that he was ignoring her, more that he couldn't hear her. At the very least this would mean the one they were here for was a soldier, mercenary or military was of less importance. _It never changes, does it? I always wind up rescuing some rookie or hotshot..._

had she been in holographic form at the time her facial features would have twitched, the system had the formula for a vaccine in it that could have easily repelled _any_ parasitic infection! _The technology to repel the flood had existed all along and had never been used?!_ Cortana could feel anger welling up inside her, and had to consciously force it aside. _I'm borderline as it is... I don't need that pushing me __back over the edge..._

Digging further into the system, Cortana quickly found out why it wasn't used; the vaccine relied heavily on cell cultures of an extinct species. _They probably never came up with an alternative..._ Pushing that aside and getting back to the task at hand, it wasn't hard to find the door-locks. Relasing them the small ray-shields on the three doors dropped and they swung open exactly as she had guessed they might.

The layout was rather straightforward, the main room was a hangar of some sort, the rear door leading to a storage area, probably for ship parts, to the right a small living area akin to a bachelor apartment, to the left a workshop or lab, it wasn't really clear which it was.

Yet... that was odd, the system showed a gap in the floor plan that was being routed power for some unknown reason. And being done in such a covert manner that only an information retrival specialist would be able to spot it.

"Think I found it, Chief." Cortana said, triumphantly stopping and wondering why he didn't respond.

_This system doesn't have any audio hardware._ A voice seemed to tell her, frantically Cortana looked around within the computer systems before noticing the other AI.

_Where..._

_Inside. My lady and I are stuck in the capsule, it has to be shut down from the outside._

Were it possible fore code to glare, Cortana would be glaring at the other AI.

Grumbling, she just wrote "All done, yank me." on the nearest screen.

Once John has retrieved her from the computer, it tooks quite a fair amount of effort to keep herself from giving him an earful for something he hadn't even done. _Keep it together Cortana. Why should I be mad at John? They used him just as they did to me. THEY are the ones that deserve to pay..._

Has she not been so focused on guiding John through the small storeroom to the hidden door, perhaps Cortana might have picked up on how irrational her train of thought was quickly becoming... or perhaps not...

The storage room seemed to contain a wide range of... strange objects. The missile in a jar was definitely a weapon, as was the rack of aircraft-scale warheads, but the rest... some of these looked like children's toys, while others looked like spare parts to some unknown machine.

Ignoring that for now, he headed for the storage locker that Cortana had said had a fake back piece. Sure enough, when pushed with a decent amount of force, the 1m x 3m slab of metal slid away with a soft grinding sound. Opening into a room that seemed to serve the sole purpose of concealing a capsule of some kind.

The room was blank save for a tiny terminal, and the capsule itself. Inside the capsule however, stood a 2m tall powered armor suit, of a design neither John nor Cortana had ever seen.

The suit was the same gunmetal color as the one he had seen in the display case, albeit with much closer fitting plates. The plates were locked so closely together and so intricately they they could allow full movement without leaving any gaps of exposed under plating. Over top this gray armor was a strange mesh that blended seamlessly with the matching collar and helmet. It seemed almost organic, Pure white with black lines traced along it's surface and tiny indents glowed a soft amber color.

Embeded in either of the shoulders three amber crystals showed, black lines tracing down them to what could only be described as an arm canon on the right, and a small energy projector on the inner side of the left wrist with an accompanying readout of some kind on the back of the left hand. Both were the same gunmetal gray as the plated section of the suit, as were what could only be close-combat blades jutting out of the left arm. The dial, tip of the projector and shoulder crystals all glowed a barely visible amber color, as if only so dim because they lay under powered within what could only be some form of stasis device.

On it's back was an angular structure, only visible because the capsule was completely transparent and standing in the middle of the room, it seemed to be an engine assembly of some sort. Sharp and angular like the collar and helmet, the same organic white pattern that covered the collar and mesh covered it's surface save for three small openings along it's lower edge. Two thrusters and what looked almost like turbine showed within the indents, though the turbine had blades much too large and widely spaced for aerial use... under water perhaps?

Stepping forward john looked over the simple console. It was straight forward enough, just a hand scanner. No buttons, controls, nothing, just a spinning glyph over a hand print. Pressing his palm to it, the screen went blank as the capsule began to hiss. Tiny cracks formed, then split into cuts separating the top and botom halves as air rushed in through them to fill the vacuum sealed chamber, fogging it's interior. A few seconds passed before the presure was equal and the top slid into the ceiling while the bottom into the floor.

A thin line of light passed across the visor, shifting if from opaque to transparent. It was pretty easy to tell, between the body shape, and the face behind the visor, that the occupant was a woman. From the subtle movements of the helmet it was clear she was talking to someone, but there was no way for john to tell who.

Looking to John, she simply said "Thanks" before slipping past him out towards her ship.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter Four**

_**Dead Silence**_

0600 Hours, Perseus drop pod bay,  
High orbit over Alliance colony "New Hope"

As always, JD was leaning against the seat of his drop-pod silently staring out from behind his helmet's tinted visor, while Buck and the others went over the battle plan. The plan never seemed to survive planet-fall, so JD's mind was wandering. The team apparently had a new member for this drop, one Gunnery Sergent Matthews, Whoever that was.

JD had heard about him before, lucky sonuvabitch, risk taker. Habit of getting himself into what should be unsurvivable scenarios and coming out alive anyway, His team was rarely as lucky. But Buck was as tough as they come and the others followed his lead, so JD wasn't worried. After all, how many ODST's could say they'd survived a 'bad drop'? Half this team, that's who.

There was another newcomer, Orrak Kasamee. It felt odd having one of them on the team, but apparently submitting to the will of the victor was tradition among their people, and we had technically won the covenant war... if you call coming within hours of your own extinction winning.

Realizing he should probably be paying more attention to the briefing than his new squad mates, JD shifts his focus to the Holographic display on the table in time to catch the details about who the opposition is. Expecting to see yet another brute raiding party, JD was puzzled by what showed up instead.

The hologram looked unlike any race the squad had ever seen. Getting up and walking closer to get a better look, he simply stared at the spinning image, confused. The body shape was definitely a jackal, but... that armor, if you could even call it that, was either organic, or woven right into it's skin. Black bone-like plates, a nasty looking wrist mounted blade, and a canon unlike any weapon the covenant had ever used replacing the entire right forearm. Dutch grumbled something about 'killer crab people', and romeo seemed convinced the glowing red piece on the chest was either a power source or a shield, but other than that nobody had any intel on them.

Suddenly, the deck shuddered and the table's holoprojector went out. For a second there was the screech of metal against metal before red emergency lights came on, and an artificial voice began repeating "Slip-space reactor breach, All hands abandon ship." the marines didn't need anymore incentive to get to their pods. They were doping from a much higher orbit than planned and were a continent out of position, but nobody wanted to be the last one off a ship that could open a slip space rupture inside itself at any second.

Another shudder shock the deck, but by this time JD already had his pod in drop position and Orrak's was close behind. He didn't have time to check the others, he needed to launch now. Overriding the launch protocol safeties and manually firing the launch thrusters early, JD rocketed away from the ship, looking up to watch for the others.

What he saw was a ship with two precise pinholes through it, like the chest plate of a sniper victim. A bolt of orange light silently lanced past the pod, and struck the ship, creating a third hole. JD's heart sank as he realized where the hits were. Main engineering, Navigational array, Bridge. Whoever was shooting at them knew exactly where to fire and how to get past their shields. One ray of hope remained, six other pods close enough to have come from the same bay as his. At least he still had his team.

The world below had been described as paradise once. So had harvest. And like harvest, New hope would likely never be the same again.

* * *

Waking up in the wrong century was bad, having to be woken up by a stranger who's armor is an anachronism was worse, waking up on a dead world with only 48 hours of oxygen and two rusted out broken down gunships that wont open up was a total disaster. She could probably salvage the MK I's hull, but the engine from the MKIII had been built to mount inside two pivoting pontoons, not a set of rotating ventral jets, and there wasn't enough time to modify it.

Samus couldn't help but stare at the other. Nothing about him made sense. The olive drab armor and white markings said terrestrial military, only they had been absorbed into the Fleet in cc15, centuries before the development of infantry scale powered armor.

"Just who or what are you? The bioscan says you're 28% human but can't identify the rest." She demanded of him. although more than enough in most cases, this was one instance where silent observation, and a once-over with the scan visor just wasn't enough.

"Spartan." the one word reply came, unusually delayed and in a strangely feminine voice. /i was sure the bioscan said male.../

"Never heard of that species. Is your home system far?" Hopefully it was close by and had a trans-light repeater... if not getting a signal to even the nearest system could take a long time.

"Spartan is not the name of an [unknown word, no analog] species. [referring to self in 3rd person?] is a [human-Augment/human-Hybrid]. Too far away to get [Unknown word, no analog] coordinates... [sub-light electromagnetic carrier, Frequency groups 10-18] likely won't be spotted for some time. The [Name? class of vessel?] is to badly damaged for long term [Bio stasis]." 'her' response came. Now Samus was certain the feminine voice did not belong to the suit's occupant. And also that the voice was trying to translate between galactic common and something else, making more than a few mistakes in the process, bad enough that she was switching to the original word in a few spots and Samus' visor had to try to display it's own translation. From the body language, the occupant seemed to be bothered by the amount of information being volunteered, which means whatever system is doing the translation is probably a faulty AI to boot.

_ok, what have we got here. part human biology... powered armor circa 1409cc based on capabilities... His main weapon has an ME converter but his suit doesn't, despite the fact that his suit has more than enough room for one... he's wearing an incorrectly assembled hazard shield from 2051cc... an independent AI without a ship to contain it, who may be defective... which i only just figured out was possible the day I froze myself... and a gas propulsion firearm that hasn't been seen since before we switched over to this calendar system..._

_WHAT. THE. FUCK._ Samus covered her visor with her free hand shaking her head. The only way this would be possible was if her people had backslid to their pre-FTL state, then started reverse engineering their own technology... _which doesn't make a shred of sense because 1/3 of the population works on said technology in one way or another, there would be no need to reverse engineer it unless everyone died. but they obviously didn't because he's standing right there... AAARRRGGGHHH._

Samus could hear Adam's voice within her suit's comm system trying to calm her down, trying to explain away the impossible contradictions, but she wasn't listening._ I'm trapped on this dead rock with a walking contradiction ..._ It was as if she could feel something within her snap, only twice before had she felt this out of control.

Bringing her hand down and her arm cannon up, Samus just coldly stated. "I don't know what the hell is going on, but you are going to start making sense in the next five seconds, or I'm going to start firing. Now, my ship is scrap, this planet is barren, and I don't have much air. How do I get off this rock?" As she spoke the plates on the arm cannon slid apart and began giving off an angry green glow, power building within the barrel, all the while the weapon made an ever increasing hum.

John had seen only one weapon before that behaved like this. _Hunter. RUN._ the back of his mind shouted at him, but true to his nature, he was more inclined to push his luck, take a chance.

* * *

Ejecting the door of the capsule, JD fell from his precarious perch on the cliff-face into the tree below. He hadn't had a landing that bad in five years... Not since Earth. Catching himself on a branch and lowering down, he spotted Orrak's pod embedded in a nearby trunk... empty.

"Oh, not this scavenger hunt bullshit again..."


	5. Chapter 5

A/N: when I update is partially dependent on how much free time I have at work, and partially on whether I feel like spending my free time doing that day. also writers block. that last chapter actually only took 2 days.

FYI, while the characterizations I like, I despise OtherM's backstory and setting retcons, so expect the story to contradict that. In her original backstory (see Metroid Manga), Samus was never military, but rather a "space cop" turned merc/bounty hunter, and the galactic federation was not _human_ _only_, just _predominantly_ human. Which none of the other games directly contradict.

* * *

**chapter 5**:  
_**Blood and Stone**_

Samus was surprised at how fast the stranger had reacted, effortlessly stepping inside her range and bringing up the pulse rifle before she even had a chance to correct her aim. Even with his biology he shouldn't be able to move like that, that would take a power assist system and scans hadn't picked up any servos or thrusters anywhere in his suit...

"If that's how you want it..." She muttered, Jumping back a good thirty feet, then latching onto his shoulder with her grapple-beam and swinging him across the ruins, releasing the nova-blast at him mid throw.

John had barely hit the ground when he had to roll to one side to evade a white hot beam of something that was setting off a Geiger counter in his HUD. Now he was in the open without cover, and whoever his opponent was seemed to be doing something to that canon. It's plates closed up, and an orange colored energy wave ran across it, this time opening up slightly differently and glowing An odd yellow color. This mode seemed to fire a spread of yellow needle like beams, three to five at a time. They spread out as they traveled, and at the rate she was firing it was acting like like some kind of energy shotgun.

Sprinting to one side as a bolt grazed his shoulder plate, John had to time his movements to the millisecond to avoid his opponent leading a shot in front of him, yet still stay out of the paths of the shots behind, returning fire whenever he was able. Getting nailed with a few of the yellow bolts and watching his shields drop, he switched direction in time to dodge the next batch. Now the weapon seemed to be firing, for lack of a better description, 'bobbing purple blobs' that exploded into arcing electricity on contact, stopping a millisecond early, another shot whizzed by millimeters from his faceplate, the trailing edge leaving a glowing stripe on the freshly recharged shield for a split second.

Finally reaching a fallen column he could use for cover, John had just enough time to reload before the column was coated in ice and shattered into tiny shards of shrapnel. _What the hell is that thing using for ammunition? _There was no time to try and figure that out though, as seconds later john was on the move again, narrowly missing being pegged by a red beam that sounded vaguely like a sniper rifle, shield meter still beeping in his ear from the damage taken when the column shattered.

Sprinting for the next column, he glanced back to fire off another burst only to see five warheads streaking directly towards him. Ducking behind another piece of wreckage and rolling to the side john never took his eye off the warheads._ These things are the size of my forearm, where was she storing them?_

John was literally dodging bullets at this point, assuming those pulsing green things could be called bullets... And despite his opponent's equally swift movements, he was landing plenty more shots on the visor and the chest plate of her suit than she was on him... Yet it seemed like they were doing almost nothing. John was sure he'd seen the shield of that suit blink about sixty or so times now, but that was it. No sign it was going to fail soon or even getting low, while his own had already been knocked out three times now. The only thing keeping him alive, likely his uncanny luck that he hadn't been hit while his shields were down. Still, the suit wasn't designed to reset the shields this often, sooner or later they would burn out completely.

Two of the warheads slammed into the stone detonating and sending a shower of dust and shards everywhere, shrapnel damage halting the shield recharge, while the other three overshot. But instead of just flying off and hitting the wall, all three just rotated, bent their guidance fins to the side and banked around around for another run at John, this time from three different angles. S_eekers? new plan._

Thinking quickly he sprinted to the right, dodging a shot of... something, he'd stopped trying to keep track of the other suit's energy weapons by this point. Taking aim and firing off a few shots, he clipped the fins of one of the missiles, sending it careening into one of the others. Then allowing the other to come almost close enough, he sidestepped and struck it with his fist just in front of the rocket motor, behind the warhead, sending it sailing back towards his opponent.

Immediately it was frozen in mid air and there was another spread of missiles on it's way, but John was ready this time. Firing a burst from the MA5C and shooting two out of they air while they were still bunched together, the entire spread of missiles exploded, throwing John back, and destroying his rifle. Wasting no time he tossed it aside and scooped up the pulse rifle from the ground where it had landed when he was thrown earlier.

Skidding back, knocked away by the blast, Samus dug her arm blades into the ground to stop herself. A quick glance up to the top of her HUD showed four gray squares above the shield meter, the other twenty still solid white and the meter hovering at about 10%. _Damn, that hit took a full tank..._

She'd managed to disable his shields, again, with the missile shrapnel. It would be sad how easily it went down, if it constantly recharging before she could land another shot wasn't infuriating. Cycling to the next beam-module Samus, paused, then cycled again deciding to pull up the Annihilator Beam. _Lets see you deal with this._

This 'spartan' was fast, faster than any organic biped should be... even some of the pirates faster genetic experiments couldn't move like that. Obviously there was something in the suit, regardless of what the scans said. Relying on auto-tracking to aim the shots wasn't going to work, they can't compensate for what they don't know is there. _I'll have to deal with this myself. _Blocking out Adam's insistence that this was counter productive, and the incessant beeping of the suit detecting shield hits, Samus shifted into a sprinting stance and took off, charging forward.

In less than a second, the jets on her suit had kicked in and she was moving fast enough that the wind resistance alone was making her shields glow a blazing orange hue. The spartan seemed to have mistaken this for an indication her shield was low, as he chose that moment to empty the pulse rifle's battery in her direction, draining another two energy tanks. Maxing out the inertial restraints and shielding on her right arm with a mental command, she slammed the cannon, missile hatches open into the chest of the spartan.

Skidding to a halt Samus watched as he struck the wall of the ruins hard enough to leave an impact crater. The x shaped indent in his chest plate sparking slightly, and a spiderweb of tiny silver cracks spreading upward and out from the mouthpiece of the helmet as a red stain spattered it's inner surface. Standing and walking over slowly, Samus finally acknowledged Adam's protests.

"Look, he's clearly not GF military, which makes him a merc or an independent. The only way to get through to those types when they get like this, is to beat the fight out of them." She stated flatly, speaking from experience, memories of Trace and Noxus springing to mind. Adam having always dealt with marines and troopers, didn't really know what to say to that. Before either of them could continue the conversation, Samus' HUD was disrupted by a burst of static, obscuring her vision.

"Hacker!" Samus growled, as Adam went to work dealing with the intrusion, she had hoped to question the soldier, but perhaps finishing him off and searching for his landing craft herself was a better option.

Visor badly cracked, shields burned out and irreparably damaged, and every suit system red-lined, John just remained embedded in the stone wall, trying not to cough up more blood. Had he been a normal human that impact would have shattered every bone in his body, probably killed him. As it was, the suit was expending it's biofoam supply trying to seal the cuts and gouges where pieces of the wall had gone through the armor, and trying to flex the gel layer under the chest piece to take the pressure off his cracked ribs. It was still close enough to airtight to survive this atmosphere, but that was about it, and john was in no shape to be going anywhere.

_So this is how it ends, is it? _He wondered watching the other walk over, each step seeming painfully slow to his senses. All the while Cortana seemed to be frantically trying to do... something, with the suit radio. Now mere inches away, she raised her cannon arm to his visor, and the plates slid apart again, blood red this time.

"Just finish it." John growled, Knowing she wouldn't understand him but not really caring. But she just stood there, motionless. For one long moment nothing happened at all, then the glow subsided and the plates snapped shut.

"You're lucky Adam figured out how to lock the firing controls," a cold voice came from the other suit. "But keep a leash on your damn AI, containing useful information will only keep it off my bad side so long..."It was monotone, mechanical. The second muffled voice behind it clearly indicating that this one was being made by the suit itself. Probably a built in translator seeing as how Cortana had been forced to translate everything earlier.

Taking a step back, then looking towards John again, "Now, again, how do I get off this rock?"

* * *

Grumbling, JD switched on his HUD overlay and took a quick sweep of the area, the Visors F.O.F. color overlay was showing no friendlies or hostiles. Nobody at all. His DMR and sidearm were stuck in the pod half way up the cliff, so the first thing he needed to do was find a new weapon. his grenades were all well and good, but not exactly plentiful. To make matters worse, his arm hurt from hitting that branch on the way down, and the nagging worry that he had cracked something wouldn't leave him alone.

_Different planet, same crap. Wonderful._ JD thought to himself, noticing the dawning sun. At least he had only lost an hour or two this time, instead of half a day. while checking the other pod for weapons, the corner of his HUD lit up, apparently picking up a transponder signal 2km north of his position.

_Knowing my luck it's probably someone's busted helmet or a damaged gun-cam..._ he mentally grumbled, getting to his feet and heading out.

Clearing the trees a few minutes later, JD immediately ducked back into them upon sighting the strange alien craft landed in the settlement ahead. His HUD was still picking up the transponder down there, somewhere inside one of the colony's prefab structures. The ship had a segmented needle like protrusion aimed skyward, orange light pulsing through slits in the sides of it. It didn't take much to realize that was what shot the Perseus down.

_Finding the team can wait. Payback time._ JD thought, grinning behind his visor. It would take some doing, but if he could find that thing's power source, he could probably do some serous damage with one of the Plasma grenades on his belt...


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6

_**Move and Counter move**_

* * *

It was eerie, the buildings were all generic prefab structures and other than a fine black dust on the ground, the occasional splash of red on a wall, or charred holes melted through random objects, there was little sign anyone had ever been here. No bodies, no wounded, and everything that wasn't welded in place or damaged had been unbolted and carried off.

Slipping silently between the structures, sweeping doorways and watching shadows, JD slowly made his way towards the strange ship. From the outside, it had a predatory look; an over-sized manta ray with jagged protrusions forming a dome shape on it's back. it's most notable feature, a giant two-pronged needle sticking upward at an angle, composed of a dozen cylindrical modules starting out jutting from the dome then tapering in and merging together until only two were left.

The protrusions that made the dome hull segments look serrated from a distance, appeared to be weapon pods hatches and drag fins close up, the majority of which at the moment were open.

Turning his focus back to the ground, JD slowed his forward pace.

**thp thp thp thp...**

_That sound wasn't there before_. JD thought, visually sweeping every corner and shadow from behind his visor, while trying not to let on that he was looking around.

**thp thp thp thp...**

_Coming from behind, getting closer..._

**thp thp thp thp...**

_You're leaving footprints in the dust, moron. Why did you bother cloaking?_

**thp thp, KSSSHHHHH- **

Sidestepping the, rather predictable, energy blade swipe easily, he wasted no time in grabbing the offending arm and bringing up his knee into where the currently invisible elbow should be. Getting a rather satisfying crunch of his metal knee guard snapping something that felt like bone, and a howl of anger for his efforts.

The energy blade was a different design than the covenant ones; bright orange, one-sided and hooked inwards about 30 degrees. Wrenching the holder's now broken arm, the blade swung around and with a rather wet scrape, dug into something. A fraction of a second later, the cloak flickered and died, revealing a a creature that might have once been a Jackal skirmisher but altered and equipped with armaments unlike those used during the covenant war.

It had been impaled on it's own weapon, one arm cleaved off and fluids dribbling from the gash in side of it's ribcage the blade had passed through. Blood mixing with some kind of greenish chemical as it flowed down the corpse' side.

Working to free the blade's emitter, frustration quickly set in when it became apparent that it was grafted directly to the largest of the Jackal's arm bones. A quick search for other weapons revealed a single grenade of unfamiliar design, but not much else that came off, let along would be usable.

Another howl in the distance convinced JD to forget the body and pick up the pace. That one had been careless, the next probably wouldn't be.

Slipping into the shadows, and ducking behind a low wall, he watched silently as another of the hostiles charged by, a wrist mounted shield active and one of those arm canons on it's right arm.

His HUD was blinking at him and beeping rather stubbornly now, apparently he was getting close to the other transponder and was under it.

Inching forward through the colony structures it was another five minutes of dodging patrols, before JD was getting close to the ship. Ducking into an apartment to try and get a view of the street below, he came up on another individual wearing familiar suit of reddish orange powered armor. Looking away from the sights of his beam rifle momentarily, the Sangheili's mandibles twisted into what JD could only assume was a smile.

"Defeating a cloaked opponent unarmed... impressive." Orrak stated, pulling the plasma rifle from the hip mount of his suit and tossing of over. It was one of the new WST models, a significant improvement over the old covenant version. The biggest changes being the replaceable universal power cells and a better cooling system, the rest was mostly cosmetic.

"He got lazy and left himself open." JD mumbled, checking the rifle's charge and setting his HUD to stop tracking Orrak's transponder. Immediately, the HUD started looking for other transponders to mark the 'next way-point', flickering one on screen for a moment before complaining about someone having just deployed active jamming.

Meanwhile Orrak turned back to his scope. "While their own weapons seem more than adequate to penetrate the shielding and armor they use, I am finding that the only way I can get through is a precise shot directly over the emitter. Anywhere else and I can expend an entire power cell to no effect." The elite explained calmly, as the rifle pulsed, then cycled out the empty power cell. Another of the armored jackals on the street below dropping as a neat little hole bore through the red crystal on it's chest appeared.

"Well, that's not good... and this thing?" JD grumbled, looking disappointedly at the weapon that had been a welcome sight just a moment ago.

"Plasma seemed more effective at disrupting their shields, but still required expending an inordinate amount of ammunition." He continued, never taking his eye from the sights as he snapped a new power cell into place.

"In other words, we need bigger guns."

"Indeed." Orrak paused to state, before firing off another shot. Another of the hostiles below dropping as the remainder finally wizened up and took cover.

"Well, I'm not waiting here to run out of ammunition." JD grumbled, readying the plasma rifle and heading for the far window. If there would be replacement armaments anywhere, it would be inside the ship. Whatever was jamming them was probably in or near the ship. On top of which, the best way to get rid of the hostiles would be to blow that thing to kingdom come, and hope it takes the bulk of them with it.

Whatever way you look at it, their next priority had to be boarding that ship.

Slipping out an open window, and climbing down the fire escape while Orrak held their attention, JD was on the ground in seconds.

"Watch your footing Jack, They use sentinel-like drones that can burrow." Orrak's words appeared on JD's HUD just as his boots hit gravel.

Inching forward his footsteps were muffled by the same gray dust as before.  
Pausing behind a damaged vehicle the aliens hadn't finished salvaging, he looked up towards the window above where he knew Orrak would be watching.

Drawing his combat knife and pointing it so that it was reflecting light at the window, he tilted it up and down to make a flash, signaling his location to Orrak.

A half second later the words appeared on his HUD again,  
"One on the opposite side of that truck, one ten feet ahead on the left, two in a doorway on the right, below the blue sign. More coming."

Signaling back once more, JD pulled one of the plasma grenades from his belt and twisted the casing. letting go and throwing it into the middle of the grouping, the casing popped open mid flight, hissing blue gas spilling from the openings.

A fraction of a second later, a loud bang, and blue flash were joined by a lone marine vaulting over the derelict vehicle and jamming the blade of his combat knife into the spinal cord of the unsuspecting Jackal, then turning him to use as a human shield against his three stunned teammates as he peppered them with plasma, meanwhile Orrak picked off their reinforcements before they could get close enough to assist.

The fight was over in seconds, but not without cost. JD now had a rather nasty burn on his arm and his human shield had been disintegrated, leaving behind a puff of gray-brown dust.

_Ok, that was really, REALLY, stupid... if that shot hadn't been mostly absorbed by the dead guy first, I'd have a hell of a lot more than a burn..._

_...I'm pretty sure the fact that this doesn't hurt, is a bad thing. Come to think of it, I don't feel anything on that side..._

Taking his now broken combat knife JD pried off his wrecked shoulder-pad to examine the wound. The shot had melted clean through the armor, and burned away both uniform and skin, fusing a chunk of the molten metal directly to the muscle.

The metal was keeping the wound from bleeding, and covering most of it, but JD couldn't move his arm and cleaning that slag out of the wound later would be difficult at best. _Wonderful, just fucking wonderful. It's hard enough to aim this thing with two hands..._

Grumbling, JD quickly got to his feet as Orrak sprinted forward to meet him.  
"We must move, they will close the gap in their perimeter soon enough."

Not in a position to argue, given he now knew just how important it was to stay out of their line of fire, JD did everything he could to keep up with Orrak.

It wasn't long before they were standing just inside the bay doors of the ship's cargo hold. The place was packed full of crates; Cases of local foliage, canisters of unprocessed minerals next to strange extractor devices, or at least what Jack guessed were extractors, and everything from cars and Medigel dispensers to garbage cans and discarded newspapers.

Whoever these guys were, they weren't choosy about what they stole. They were just stripping bare everything they could get their hands on.

"Ship with a hold full of stolen loot... Reminds me of old pirate stories." he muttered, splitting up with Orrak long enough to use an Optican Medigel dispenser these 'pirates' had taken. After a minute or two and a bit of work, he could at least feel his arm again. The downside being that the painkillers weren't nearly strong enough for this kind of injury, and the Medigel could only heal the parts that were still there. Can't do much for the surface damage.

_Son of a bitch! I think I was better off with the nerve damage..._ JD thought to himself, wincing and putting the empty canister down. Gritting his teeth, he wrapped the burn as quickly as he could with a bandage from a medkit in a nearby crate. Closing it and stuffing it in his backpack, along with the dispenser's second Medigel canister, before getting up, Jack snuck back to where Orrak had been camping between crates, waiting for him.

"The bio-foam and antibiotics in this look like they're still good. We'll probably need them. Right now our priority should be finding weapons, ammunition, and something to make a bomb out of." Jack whispered, crouched beside his squad mate.

"Agreed, but we should hurry. Already we've been here too long."

The colonists had been blasting to make an artificial basin for a new dam, so finding explosives didn't take long. The pirates had scavenged a few hundred meters of primer cord, and crates of charges and detonator caps. Assembling a makeshift bomb took all of twenty minutes.

Weapons on the other hand, were a problem. The hold had plenty of stun guns and pistols, but little beyond that. Civilians weren't exactly authorized for the higher grade weapons, and the new Inter-System Travel Authority had been more than a little paranoid after the UNSC had to glass a flood outbreak on one of the new colonies.

Leaving the hold proved to be another problem. The doors had no controls, just a translucent blue shield across them that barred access. John wasted a good half hour trying to cut open a wall panel to get at the mechanism before the duo had to hide to avoid an enemy patrol. Once the patrol had passed, JD returned to the door.

_So... all I have do do is shoot it? ...wow, now I feel kinda dumb for not thinking of that_. He mused, unconsciously rubbing his sore shoulder.

Raising the plasma rifle and firing off a single pulse, the hatch opened. Leaving JD wishing he had waited longer as the eight pirates behind the door turned one by one, arming their close combat blades and particle cannons.

"...Fuck."


End file.
